Some of you may have read tweets about musical performances at Hartford here, or here, or here, maybe here or finally here. Let’s start with that last tweet #coheedkid.

#coheedkid’s story it pretty simple really. He’s a 16 or 17 year old kid who is a very decent guitarist and really likes progressive/rock emo bands like Coheed and Cambria or the Fall of Troy, etc. Every week him and his chain smoking, refillable coffee and soda drinking friends will swarm upon our patio and remain there all evening. About 4 to 5pm, after school now that it has started again, they show up and are in and out of the shop all night. There numbers have steadily grown since August, them and their goth clothes & the girls with their Hot Topic skirts with the Misfits logo on it without a clue where it originally came from or any idea who Glenn Danzig is.

Whatever. They’re just kids. Now, #coheedkid is nice and polite and always asks if he can take our house acoustic guitar out to the patio to play for the evening. We always obliged, and appreciate his asking. Once Open Mic Night starts, he signs up somewhere in the middle of the evening and plays two songs. They’re usually both some progressive/rock emo song by Coheed and Cambria. That is to say, the kid can rip it on guitar, usually making a mistake or two, but when he tries to play AND SING at the same time, he usually guffs it up significantly. So each week, towards the middle of the set, I have two, poorly performed 7-minute songs to look forward to. But God bless ‘em for getting up there and doing it. Everyone’s terrible before they’re good.

#coheedkid’s not even the worst part. I’d be very happy to listen to him try to play those songs all night than have to listen to a few people who read poetry during the evening. Supposedly, all it takes to be a poet is the ability to rhyme if you based it solely on the crap I’ve heard. Aren’t you aware the poetry can be about more than your relationship problems or frustrated rantings? People don’t clap after your performance because it was good, they’re just happy the poem is over.

A brief aside about the sound system. Two mics, on mic stands, into a Crate acoustic amp. Awesome.

To preface #freepaperlady‘s behavior, I need to explain a bit about our store. We carry the St. Louis Post Dispatch. It costs $1 (plus 10 cents tax.) People often buy the Post, or bring their own in, and read it in the store over a meal or just coffee. Some even leave their’s behind for others to enjoy (or for us to trash/recycle for them, whatever.) We even have a little cart by the door underneath our dish bus that collects these used papers. This is a courtesy for our guests.

Well, in comes #freepaperlady (which as a nickname was coined by @travisbursik I think, he was the first person I heard say it anyway.) This lady is older, probably upper 50′s, who comes into the store in the last hour we’re open any given evening. Let me clarify, she only comes into the store in the last hour we’re open. She immediately looks underneath the bus for the day’s Post. It’s usually there. She picks up the paper, walks over to the bar and asksstops me from the closing tasks I’m busy doing to ask for a *ahem* free cup of water. After receiving such a cup, she then finds somewhere in the cafe to sit and spread the paper out. Literally, pages strewn about all over whatever table she’s sitting at. When she finally gets up and leaves the store, usually a few minutes before close, she doesn’t return the paper to where she found it & she doesn’t put her free water cup in the bus. She leaves it all on the table for me to clean up which is rude even for our paying (and tipping!) customers. We are not a full service restaurant and you’re not a paying customer. Thanks a lot biz.

Sometimes, and boy do I relish these times, they aren’t any Post’s left by other customers. Yep, no free papers for #freepaperlady. The other night was one such night! When she came in that evening, she went through her usual routine and after seeing no Post’s, she grabbed one of the free Riverfront Times which is also by the door and come up to the register for that cup of water. Well, the Post’s we have on sale are right there by the register, and we actually had two or so left. She asked me if she could just have one of the Post’s still for sale for free since “it’s so close to the end of the day.” Are you serious? I guess I could just give you a free cup of coffee as well since, you know, we close in a half an hour and I’m just going to dump it down the drain. Goodness. I tweeted about it here. While that was pretty hilarious, nothing compares to what happened tonight.

Tonight the woman came in and did her usual thing, grabbed a paper, asked for a water, make distracting small talk that distracts you from your closing task, but then the unthinkable happened. #freepaperlady takes the cup intended for water and fills it with half and half from the coffee station. This half and half hasn’t been used in hours and was probably last filled in the early afternoon. Yeah, room temperature milk that has been on the counter for probably 5 hours. Gross. Gross. Gross! It’s one thing to be cheap, but this lady is ridiculous. Next thing you know she’ll be asking us to refill the milk containers so she can have free cold milk. Then she’ll start adding sugar or honey from the condiments, or maybe even cinnamon & chocolate powder and make a free chocolate milk. I think if it gets to that point I’ll start calling her #hobolady and ya’ll will all be in on the joke.

Moving on.

A few more frequently tweeted abouts. There’s a ton of Mom’s who come into the shop with their non-descript kids for lunch. Because Hartford has a kids area, Mom’s feel pretty comfortable having group lunch sessions there so they don’t have to worry about keeping their kids entertained. This usually means a pack of wild, screaming 2-5 year olds and a bunch of oblivious Mom’s letting them run amok. One such tweets can be found here & here. (Also, #howfire is a meme I accidentally started on twitter last year when I misspelled wanting to spit “hot fire” onto something, or someone. The error was much to my chagrin and to everyone else’s delight. So much so that I eventually embraced it. Who doesn’t like begetting a meme? Unfortunately I don’t think the original tweet exists on twitter any longer. It appears twitter only allows you to go back like 3200 tweets. Lame.

There is one Mom in particular that I named #JoanCusakMom because she looks a bit like and sounds a lot like Joan Cusak. Nothing special or ridiculous about her, and she’s really nice, but she has that voice. It’s one of the few things that sets her apart from all the other Moms who buy $6 grilled cheese & peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for their screaming kids who only eat about half their meal before the plate and food is put into the bus and not the trash, $7 meals for themselves, a $1.50 8oz cup of goldfish and $3.80 latte and sometimes a $2.50 scone or scoop of ice cream but, oh God, can they not tip because they’re on a cash allowance from “Daddy” and only have so much to spend. At least that’s what I heard anyway.

As I coin new nicknames for our patrons I’ll be sure to let ya’ll know. Obviously as it happens on twitter first, then maybe later here if there’s enough confusion. Anyway, I hope you enjoyed the explanation of #freepaperlady and you’ll definitely LOL a bit more in future tweets.

Oh, and one last work related tweet about when a customer asked me if we had any Stevia.

Today’s weekly is a bit more difficult than previous weeks for sure, as mentioned throughout these comments.  But the trained bag hunter must always be mentally consulting his ‘bag checklist for the scrotest of the scrote.  With that in mind, (pun intended), we start with 3rd place: Tad & Trina.
1. Realistically, Tad’s only offense is the obnoxiously awful douche-hair.
2. You could stretch it to say that he’s making a “douche” face by not showing any teeth in his smile.  But I would let it slide.

2nd place: Sharpie Ringworm
1. Much like ‘Bag Bats Maru, this douche is too funny to be criminal.  It’s like the wank woke up from a nap, and instead of having a dick on his face, he has a spiderweb form the twilight zone that is shouting “Yes, I am a douche-bag, but I don’t give a ****.”  That lack of concern for his appearance nearly disqualifies it as a douche offense, but…
2. He is making the douche face in the picture.  The pose itself puts him over and above T&T especially considering his facial “tatt” is by far worse than Tad’s hair.
3. The shaved chest. That goes without needing any explanation.
4. Kind of too close to tell if the couple is playing dress up or not, or if the dude actually shops at Armani/Exchange and wears clothes like that on a daily basis. Hrmm…

Which brings us to this weeks winner, with most offenses, Butthead:
1. He’s making the Douche face, and a larger one than TSR
2. The ever present Mandana. Was this shot taken in New Jersey?
3. Bling on wrist also points to the great state of douche productivity.
4. Commingling with Bleeth’s. This is obvious.  Never do the sweet hotts we long to steal from utter Bleethdom let random douche filth lick their naked rear ended goodness on film.  I imagine them being named Angelica and Sara Beth.  What happened, girls?  Seriously.
5. Last offense, Butthead is trying to make the ‘Bag hand, but couldn’t let go of that left hand on that chicks rumpus.  This is just douche laziness, or craftiness, as to fool and avoid us bag hunters.  We will not be fooled.  We also will not be avoided.

Winner: Butthead.

On the same page, another digger had something rather funny to say about it:

“So Bill & Jerry went to live with the “common” folk. In the process, they bug everyone in the house with their presence. They make people adapt to their tastes rather than actually adapting to them. When they order out for Chinese they coast on their reputations and offer nothing of value back in exchange for the food. Finally, they are framed as thieves due to lack of security and assuming that everyone in the house is really honest.

This actually sounds more like Vista than I initially gave them credit for.”

This Ranch-styled restaurante serves up the finest traditional mexican cuisine this side of Juarez. You’ll feel like Clint Eastwood in “Two Mules for Sister Sara” with your ten-gallon hat and spurs (traditional garb not required.) Try the Burrito Ranchero, or the Chori Pollo (pronounced “Poe-Yo” you gringo!) and you’ll be begging for a siesta before you finish your chips!
La Hacienda Jalisco’s atmosphere is Mexico like you’ve never seen it: with a cobblestone carpet (that is a carpet with the appearance of granite!) Do you habla espanol? Try ordering your meal in Spanish to enrich your cross-cultural experience as the staff is fluent in the language of our neighbors to the south. Don’t like to wait? ¡No problemo! The Hacienda employs Speedy Gonzales, so your food is served fast.
What are you waiting for amigo? Get your trasero in gear and head over to the best mexican place in Greenville for a meal that is muy bueno.

I also wrote a news article about Google’s latest amazing and free product: Chrome.

Google out to polish the internet browser with Chrome

The company with the world’s most popular search engine has entered the realm of internet browsing with the open-source Chrome. Released on Tuesday, Google has attempted to reinvent the web experience for all by making a faster, more stable, and more secure web browser. Chrome implements several breakthrough designs including tabbed processing, an advanced Java Script engine, a smarter address bar, and a user defined home page with thumbnails of nine most visited pages, searches, and recently closed tabs.

“So why are we launching Google Chrome?” Google asks on it official blog. “Because we believe we can add value for users and, at the same time, help drive innovation on the web.” At first glance, Google Chrome is plain and simple with the bear minimum of buttons and controls. This was by design because to Google the browser is “only a tool to run… pages, sites and applications that make up the web.” Some of those applications, most prominently web searches, Google has on lock-down, though the company has others like Gmail, Calendar, and particularly word processing that present potential “malware” to mammoth Microsoft.

Microsoft, which claims 72% of the browser user base with Internet Explorer, is about to release IE8. Microsoft general manager of IE Dean Hachamovitch has claimed IE8 is better “for what people do every day again and again,” but it has already tested slower than Chrome. IE also comes pre-installed on all PCs shipped with Windows so it is in no way threatened by Chrome, but Google is not “out to get” IE, or Firefox, or any other browser.

Google’s main purpose in creating Chrome is to make the web better for everyone by encouraging innovation by means of competition. And, in typical Google fashion, the project is completely free and open source so other companies, like Microsoft and Mozilla, can apply their ideas to their own browsers; thereby creating a better web experience for all. And for those of us who do not understand techy-speak, the whole project is explained in a comic book found at google.com/chrome.

By taking products that usual cost money, making them better, then releasing them for free and turning a profit, Google is a company that stands alone in the marketplace, and there has yet to be anything it has put it hands on that hasn’t turned to gold, or in this case, chrome.

Sources:
Google Official Blog
The Age
Google Chrome Comic Book
Google Apps

I’m pretty startled, and all I catch of what he was saying is “this is the police, come out with your hands up.”  I’m immediately excited, and then kind of confused, followed by absolute terror, which was quickly followed by bemusement.  I’m thinking to myself after this flood of emotion:

“This is awesome!!!”

“I’ve never experienced anything like this before, some neighbor is getting busted!”  After the dude had finished that first sentence that I only caught a portion of, he started on a second.  It went something to the effect of:

“Rob Muriel, this is the police, we have come for your anus.  Your anus is ours.  Come out with your hands up immediately.”

Now, for those of you who don’t know, Rob Muriel is my roommate.  The one who lives across from me.  Not Matt, who lives on the other end of the apartment, facing the other street, not the one I’m facing.  Rob’s room is facing the same street that my room is, and it’s the same street the dude with the megaphone is on.  After hearing him say Rob’s name, I realized that this isn’t awesome at all, in fact, it’s a prank, and really inconsiderate.  I think to myself “What the fuck?” and start getting out of bed.

I’m wearing some pajama pants, and am shirtless as I walk to my window to crack the shades.  I want to know who this is.  Who this is who has so rudely awoken me.  Good thing I don’t have to be up early for anything, otherwise I would have been quite upset.

As I’m parting the blinds I hear a third sentence claiming again that the man with the megaphone has ownership of the private sector of Rob’s glute.  I’m not wearing my glasses, so all I see outside is a big, black or dark blue van with white, skwiggly writing on the side that reminded me of a florist’s van.  They’re parked in the middle of the street, at the corner of Purdue and Tulane.  Still shouting for Rob to come outside, I open the window, and cup my hands around my mouth and shout:

“You motherfuckers!  Other people live here!”

To which they speedily drove off saying “Eh, uh, thanks, asshole” and did the siren sound some megaphones make.  Good comeback, I think to myself.  Gladly they drove off, cause for some reason I was prepared, even considering my current attire, to go outside and beat the shit out of anyone and everyone glassesless, because I didn’t want them broken.  That would be difficult, and maybe impossible; I’d be fighting blurs.  Blind rage I guess.

The next day Rob sends me a text in the morning around 9am asking that I would call him when I woke up.  Around 10:30am I call him, and he says “I’m so glad you called right now, I wanted to ask you what happened last night.”

Apparently Rob was dreaming when the first shout rang out, he said it appeared in his dream, he thinks, but it woke him up.  He got up around the time I did and went to the window, looked out, and then heard me shout, and heard there tart, immature reply, and saw them speed off.  After which, he went back to bed.  He asked my side of the story because he wasn’t sure if his experience actually happened or if he was, to quote word for word, “just tripping balls.”  I reassured him that there are no balls to trip over.

After I got back into bed after shouting at the dudes in the van, I laughed aloud three separate times about how I responded, and then fell asleep.

Anyway, around noonish I helped a guy purchase a new battery for an old iBook G4 portable.  After he got my attention, I noticed that the guy was none other than the head of movement organization at the alma David Hoag.  H to the O to the Aaaaaggg!  I was surprised, I slightly smiled and said “Hey” in an almost friendly way.  We had a brief conversation over what it was he was looking for, then I told him I’d have to run to the back to see if we carry the battery he was looking for.  A G4 iBook is pretty old, so I wasn’t sure if we still would have it in stock.  I noticed that through the course of our exchange Dr. Hoag did not notice me as someone he knew.  There was not a flicker of recognition in his eyes.  I think this rather odd, as I served him coffee nearly every morning for a whole year and I do not look any different, at least not vastly.  He even glanced at my name tag…

While back in the back, I tell Brad Ritter, alum ’04, that David Hoag is up front and he doesn’t recognize me and I told him the reason why I think he should.  Brad laughed, and then wondered aloud if Hoag would recognize him.  I proceed to the front with the battery, then direct him to the nearest register (’cause I was actually stocking the accessories wall when he ran into me) and then proceeded to overhear him chat it up with Mark at the register.  After finishing the purchase (we always ask for zip codes for marketing and store planning purchases, I wanted to answer the question for Hoag so bad, but held back lest he would recognize me by proxy) he mentioned to Mark that now he didn’t have to hear his wife complain “about the stinking battery dying so fast” (in a stereotypical obnoxious wife voice).

I was amused.  Or was I bemused?  I used to joke that Hoag didn’t know my name, and now I know for sure.  He certainly never did.

I hope you all had a happy Thanksgiving and a glorious Friday of Black.  And people remember your name.